Steeleye Span - The Female Drummer

I was brought up in Yorkshire and when I was sixteen
Oh I ran away to London and a soldier I became
With my fine cap and feather, likewise my rattling drum
They learned me to play upon the rub-a-dub-a-dum

With my gentle waist so slender, my fingers long and small
and to play upon the rub-a-dub the best of them all

And so many were the pranks that I saw among the French
And so boldly did I fight, my boys, although I'm but a wench
And in buttoning up my trousers so often have I smiled
To think I lay with a thousand men and a maiden all the while

With my fine cap and feather, likewise my rattling drum
They learned me to play upon the rub-a-dub-a-dum
With my gentle waist so slender, my fingers long and small
and to play upon the rub-a-dub the best of them all

But they never found my secret out until this very hour
When they sent me off to London to keep sentry o'er the Tower
When a young girl fell in love with me and she found that I was a maid
She went up to my officer my secret she betrayed

With my fine cap and feather, likewise my rattling drum
They learned me to play upon the rub-a-dub-a-dum
With my gentle waist so slender, my fingers long and small
and to play upon the rub-a-dub the best of them all

He unbuttoned then my red tunic and he found that it was true
“It's a shame,” he says, “to lose a pretty drummer boy like you”
So now I must return to my mum and dad at home
And along with my bold comrades it's no longer can I roam

With my fine cap and feather, likewise my rattling drum
They learned me to play upon the rub-a-dub-a-dum
With my gentle waist so slender, my fingers long and small
and to play upon the rub-a-dub the best of them all